Mainstream’s first Chilean solar farm ready for PV panels

These rows of gleaming new steel stanchions stand in barren expanse of the Atacama Desert as the latest advance in the construction of our huge 1.3GW Andes Renovables platform.

Over the coming months they will be fitted out with some 450,000 photovoltaic panels by our contractors Sterling & Wilson, creating Mainstream’s first Solar PV farm in Chile.

With 55.5km of transmission lines also under construction, the 145 MW Río Escondido project is on course to begin feeding the grid in 2021, generating enough clean electricity to power more than 190,000 homes and saving the emission of 185,000 tons of CO2 each year.

The build-out, near the commune of Tierra Amarilla, is taking place alongside the construction of three wind farms – Tchamma and Cerro Tigre to the north in Antofagasta, and Alena in the southern Biobío region of Chile.

This 571 MW portfolio of projects, known as Condor, is first phase of Andes Renovables, a US$1.7bn investment that will help the country achieve its decarbonisation goals.